I’LL TELL YA…..BUT I MIGHT HAVE-TA KILL YA!

I’LL TELL YA…..BUT I MIGHT HAVE-TA KILL YA!

(Department of Defense, John F. Hacket, Mark Lowenthal)

(Russian Times, Hayley Taskayama, Washington Post, Dana Priest)

(William M. Arkin, Michael Warner, Kenneth McDonald, Matt DeLong, Frazer Chronicle)

The United States Intelligence Community, (IC) is a federation of 16 separate U.S. government agencies that work separately as well as together to conduct intelligence activities considered necessary for the conduct of foreign relations and national security of the United States. Members’ organizations of the IC include intelligence agencies, military intelligence, and civilian intelligence and analysis offices within federal executive departments. The IC is led by the Director of National Intelligence (DNI), who reports directly to the President of the United States.

Among their varied responsibilities, the members of the Community collect and produce foreign and domestic intelligence, contribute to military planning, and perform espionage. The IC was established by Executive Order 12333, signed on December 4, 1981 by President Ronald Reagan.

The Washington Post, in 2010, reported that there were 1,271 government organizations, and 1,931 private companies in 10,000 separate locations throughout the United States that are working on counterterrorism, homeland security, and intelligence, and that the intelligence community, IC as a whole includes 854,000 people with top-secret clearances. According to a recent study by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, private contractors make up 29% of the workforce in the U.S. intelligence community, and cost the equivalent of 49% of their personnel budget.

INTELLIGENCE COMMUNITY AND ITS PURPOSES

The term Intelligence Community was first used during Lt. Gen. Walter Bedell Smith’s tenure as the Director of Central Intelligence (1950-1953). Intelligence is information that agencies collect, analyze, and distribute in response to government leaders’ questions and requirements.

With regards to the U.S. intelligence information, in a broader term, the U.S. IC was the collecting, analyzing, and production of sensitive information to support national security leaders, including policymakers, military commanders and members of Congress. Safeguarding these processes and this information, through counterintelligence activities. Execution of covert operations, approved by the President, the IC strives to provide valuable insight on important issues by gathering raw intelligence, analyzing that date in context, and producing timely and relevant products for customers at all levels of national security…..from the war-fighter on the ground to the President in Washington D.C.

The IC has six primary objectives, and their relatively simple and straight forward:

1. Collection of information needed by the President, the National Security Council, the Secretary of State, the Secretary of Defense, and other executive branch officials for the performance of their duties and responsibilities.

2. Production and Dissemination of intelligence.

3. Collection of information concerning, and the conduct of activities to protect against intelligence activities directed against the United States, international terrorist and/or narcotics activities, and other hostile activities directed against the U.S. by foreign powers, organizations, persons and their agents.

4. Special activities (defined as activities conducted in support of U.S. foreign policy objectives abroad which are planned and executed) so that the (role of the United States Government is not apparent or acknowledged publicly) and functions in support of such activities, but which are not intended to influence United States political processes, public opinion, policies, or media and do not include diplomatic activities of the collection and production of intelligence or related support functions.

5. Administration and support activities within the United States and abroad necessary for the performance of authorized activities.

6. Other such intelligence activities as the President may direct from time to time.

AND THE NUMBERS ARE

There are 16 different (yet the same) members that constitute the U.S. Intelligence community, and can be referred to as offices, or bureaus within the federal executive departments. Some members of the IC also call the 16 offices or bureaus elements, but most of those guys are nearing retirement, and as yet, the term hasn’t caught on.

Within the IC there are seven departments that constitute the United States break-down of agencies bureaus, or offices:

Independent agencies;

Central Intelligence Agency, (CIA)

United States Department of Defense;

Defense Intelligence Agency, (DIA)

National Security Agency, (NSA)

National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, (NGA)

National Reconnaissance Office, (NRO)

Air Force Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance Agency, (AFISRA)

Army Intelligence and Security Command, (INSCOM)

Marine Corps Intelligence Activity, (MCIA)

Office of Naval Intelligence, (ONI)

United States Department of Energy;

Office of Intelligence and Counterintelligence, (OICI)

United States Department of Homeland Security;

Office of Intelligence and Analysis, (I&A)

Coast Guard Intelligence, (CGI)

United States Department of Justice;

Federal Bureau of Investigation, National Security Branch, (FBI/NSA)

Drug Enforcement Administration, Office of National Security Intelligence, (DEA/ONSI)

United States Department of State;

Bureau of Intelligence and Research, (INR)

United States Department of the Treasury;

Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence, (TFI)

The IC has been shortened over the years, as well as revised from the 1947 National Foreign Intelligence Program as defined by the National Security Act of 1947 which refereed to all programs, projects and activities of the intelligence community. There was the National Intelligence Program, (NIP) the Director of National Intelligence (DNI.)

The Military Intelligence Program, (MIP) refers to the programs, projects or activities of the military department to acquire intelligence solely for the planning and conduct of tactical military operations by the U.S. Armed Forces. These programs are controlled by the Secretary of Defense. In 2005 the Department of Defense combined the Joint Military Intelligence Program and the Tactical Intelligence and Related Activity programs to form the MIP.

SINCE THE DEFINITION OF THE (NIP) AND THE (MIP) OVERLAP, SOMETIMES THEY PROVE PROBLEMATIC, DO YOU THINK!

THE RUSSIAN TIMES HAS IT RIGHT

According to an article that appears in the Russian Times stated that United States government officials with “intimate knowledge” of a little known Central Intelligence Agency spy program now say the CIA post September 11, 2001 efforts to send undercover agents around the globe was a colossal flop.

According to a former CIA official who spoke with Los Angeles Times reporter Ken Dilanian, the agency spent more than $3 billion dollars on the spy effort. During the effort, roughly after the September 11 attack on the World Trade buildings, the Pentagon, and the crash in a Pennsylvania field to about 2005 unleashed hundreds of agents as foreign business men trying to infiltrate as many rough organizations as possible.

Without exception, the operating budgets for each intelligence agency is highly classified, but an educated guess (with the help of Edward Snowden) places the 2010 budget around $80 billion dollars, or 80 thousand million or enough money to fill several semi trailers.

Mixed in with the intelligence budget (which, by the way, is tax dollars and that would be us) NSA has seen fit to grab as much domestic email Intel from the same taxpayers as they could possibly get. I have no doubt that other U.S. agencies go greedy, and amass as much information on U.S. citizens as possible, what the hell, its damned easy to collect.

There have been other failures, but again, if I shared them with you, I’d have ta kill ya, and at the present time, I’m just too damned tired from writing this blog. At times, it’s what our government does best; they pull their wild shenanigans, and put us to sleep.

HAVE A NICE DAY!